the_mysterious_mr_enterfandomcom-20200214-history
First Impressions - Twilight Time
Disclaimer: these are just my first impressions and may not reflect my overall feelings towards an episode. Hey, they're finally addressing Twilight's princesshood. It just took them like 15 episodes. Yeah, my first thought is that this should have been like episode 4 of the season, although I can't really hold it against this particular episode. Unfortunately because this episode came so late in the season it really gives us a few questions: most notably, why hasn't something like this happened sooner? That being said the set-up isn't insulting like it was in Rainbow Falls. I can suspend my disbelief enough, and who knows maybe it chronologically happened right after Castle Mane-ia. On another note, it wasn't just me imagining things in Flight to the Finish, Sweetie Belle definitely sounds older. Dave Polsky has been really interesting this season. I've personally never been on the "he's one of the worst writers of the show" train, but I'd never imagine that I'd actually feel excited when his episodes roll around because throughout the whole of season 4 (at least with me), he's had a perfect track record and he seems to be growing as a writer. I mean really growing because if I didn't know any better I'd have guessed that Rarity Takes Manehattan was written by anyone other than him, and if I'd have to guess here Twilight Time feels a lot like an M. A. Larson episode if only for the resemblance to Ponyville Confidential. That's not a bad thing because I do enjoy serious stories like this more than pure comedy romps (at least as a whole). The story managed to keep me interested all the way through, and that's for something that Ponyville Confidential, Family Appreciation Day, and pretty much any other CMC episode lacked: they had Diamond Tiara as a villain and didn't make her distractingly unlikeable. She's there a lot, but the episode has her unlikeable behavior heavily subdued which extremely plays to the episode's benefit. Not to mention that she's only there when she absolutely needs to be and she doesn't do anything that makes me want to stab her with a salad fork. Maybe that's because the CMC cause their own problem in this episode. Diamond Tiara isn't even a catalyst here. Now one part of the story that did catch me off guard is when the CMC failed their tasks at the end, and then immediately succeeded in doing them when everyone left. Did they purposefully fail in front of everyone to demonstrate how sorry they were/get themselves out of this mess? I mean, I assume that I just wish that the episode made it a bit more clear. There were plenty of little things I liked in the episode too. Scootaloo dismantles Pipsqueaks' scooter. You see, even if he was "innocently insensitive" he still faced some consequences for his actions. Speaking of that, the one joke with Pinkie worked because it was quick and she had no reason that a bunch of kids right outside the window might be the cause of any trouble and it ended exactly when it needed to. Twilight eats almost as messy as I do. Sweetie Belle's fantasy of tormenting Diamond Tiara was incredibly satisfying and definitely an improvement on Castle Mane-ia's Angel Bunny getting crushed joke. Not to mention that Sweetie Belle is actually able to do magic now, that's good to know and it's the proper way to do fan-service. Besides the overall concept, you know Ponyville kids just now learning that the CMC hang out with Twilight (they know that Sweetie Belle is Rarity's sister, Applebloom is Applejack's sister, and Scootaloo hangs out with Rainbow Dash which I assume they know hang out with Twilight) there doesn't seem to be any bigger problems that I noticed against this episode. If its closest relative is Ponyville Confidential, I'd say that it's an improvement if only for the tolerable Diamond Tiara and lack of mean-spirited overtones. Category:Miscellaneous